Horizons Unlimited

By Virginia V. George

The care and devotion bestowed upon the presentation of reincarnation
and its related theosophic principles shine warmly throughout
another book co-authored by Sylvia Cranston — this one with Carey
Williams — entitled Reincarnation: A New Horizon in Science,
Religion, and Society (Theosophical University Press, 1984;
385 pages). Earlier books by Cranston and Head such as Reincarnation:
The Phoenix Fire Mystery, were magnificently researched affairs
— veritable encyclopedias of reincarnation, and extremely valuable
as reference works. Sylvia Cranston is a well-known reincarnation
researcher, and Carey Williams a health education specialist who
also conducts courses in death education.

This present volume is quite different, lovingly crafted and written
more as a narrative, intermingled with personal views and comments.
A portion is devoted to case histories of children who during
their very early years appear to have retained memories of a former
life. Each case is well documented by Dr. Ian Stevenson, Carlson
Professor of Psychiatry at the University of Virginia Medical
School, who is highly regarded by his colleagues. He has flown
all over the world to obtain material to corroborate his findings
and thus far five volumes have been published.

Dr. Stevenson found that children between two and four are of
the best age to remember their experiences, and that between five
and eight they begin to forget as they move out of the narrow
family parameters and enter school and the larger world. These
case histories are carefully substantiated so far as that is possible.
Children usually begin by describing events, giving names of people
or places where they say they lived, at times becoming angry when
adults do not listen or believe them. Sometimes they complain
of feeling cramped in these "small bodies."

At times children point to marks on their bodies (birthmarks)
and say that this was where a knife, or bullet, or other weapon
had wounded them. Having examined at least 200 such birthmarks,
Dr. Stevenson thinks there must be some kind of nonphysical body
that exists "in a state of which we know almost nothing."
In theosophic writings this is called the astral or model body,
which automatically records the effects of all experiences.

The section devoted to Near-Death Experiences (NDE's) will interest
everyone whether they are reincarnationists (unwieldy word!) or
not. Throughout the chronicled cases there runs a common theme,
as reported by Dr. Raymond Moody in his book, Life After Life.
The person is drastically ill or being surgically operated
upon. He (or she, throughout) hears the doctor's/bystander's voice
noting his grave condition, and finds himself out of his body,
floating near the ceiling and looking down upon the scene. He
goes through a long, dark tunnel at the end of which people he
has known and loved come to meet him and help him. A being of
light appears before him who emanates an almost indescribable
love and understanding and who shows him a panoramic vision of
his past life for his appraisal. "At some point he finds
himself approaching some sort of barrier or border, apparently
representing the limit between earthly life and the next life,"
and he understands that he must return to his earthly life as
his time has apparently not yet come. His return is made reluctantly
because he has felt such joy, peace, and serenity that he wants
to stay in that state always.

The near-death experience has a profound effect upon most people,
very often changing their entire lives and certainly their feelings
about death and afterlife. In some cases children speak of having
encountered holy men or beings in white who had welcomed them
when they previously died, and guided them. Such beings did not
seem to choose the next birth for the soul; they simply took it
to the place where it should be in order to make its choice.

Again, individuals tell of operating in a more subtle finer body
that sees through and passes through walls as though they were
not there, traveling great distances with the speed of thought.
One subject recounted how he had been in a near-fatal accident
and left his body. The subject said he thought of his mother at
home, was instantly with her, and saw her receive the telegram
which told of his accident. Thereupon, against his will he found
himself transported to a room near his home where a neighbor woman
had given birth to a stillborn baby girl. He had "an almost
irresistible impulse to press my face through the back of the
baby's head so that my face would come out at the same place as
the child's." However, sensing his mother's grief, he realized
that he ought to return to his own body. This he did, "and
the effort caused the real me to sit up in bed fully conscious."
To the astonishment of his parents he repeated almost word for
word some of the conversation they had had about his accident.

The authors explain the difference between clinical and biological
death and in this connection they quote from H. P. Blavatsky's
Isis Unveiled that "a resuscitation, after the soul
and spirit have entirely separated from the body and the last
electric thread is severed, is impossible." And from her
Secret Doctrine (1, 555), that resuscitation can occur
if the "astral 'vital body' has not been irreparably separated
from the physical body by the severance of the magnetic or odic
cord [Odic, Od: electricity or magnetism]."

Reincarnation is traced in Christianity, Gnosticism, Judaism,
Hinduism, Buddhism, all shown to have the same underlying beliefs
and teachings. The acceptance of rebirth is so common in India
that their philosophers deal with what they consider much more
important: freeing the soul from the cycle of reincarnation to
pass into ultimate spiritual realization, or nirvana. The Bhagavad-Gita
expresses rebirth beautifully in the familiar lines: "As
a man throweth away old garments and putteth on new, even so the
dweller in the body, having quitted its old mortal frames, entereth
into others which are new."

There is a good deal of space allotted to the life of the Buddha,
and many of his teachings, including reincarnation, are similar
to those in every great religion. They quote Sir Edwin Arnold:

Our Lord attained Samma-sambuddh; he saw,
By light which shines beyond our mortal ken,
The line of all his lives in all the worlds;
Far back, farther back, and farthest yet,
Five hundred lives and fifty. . . . -- The Light of Asia,
Bk. vi

The chapter, "Judaic Teachers and Prophets," traces
reincarnation in the Old Testament, the Kabbalah, and in Jewish
mysticism. One small and delightful quotation — "Prayer
Before Retiring at Night" by the great Hasidic teacher Rabbi
Shneur Zalman:

Master of the Universe! I hereby forgive anyone who has angered
or vexed me, or sinned against me, either physically or financially,
against my honor or anything else that is mine, whether accidentally
or intentionally, inadvertently or deliberately, by speech or
by deed, in this incarnation or in any other. — Siddur Tehillat
Hashem

Elaine Pagels calls Gnostics "Christians who possess knowledge
(gnosis) of Jesus' secret teaching — knowledge hidden from the
majority of believers" until they have "proven themselves
to be spiritually mature" — surely a reference to early
Mystery schools. Gnostic teaching and instruction were open to
women as well as men and rebirth of the human soul was taught.

The authors believe that religious wars and intolerance would
cease if all people included in their beliefs the best of each
of the world's religions, for then "all of humanity's Great
Teachers would become the teachers of us all," This book
offers that on a small scale. If someone picks up a book like
this, looks at the title and interest quickens, then perhaps all
the quotations and presentations given here will strike a chord,
stir a memory. So many people need "proof"; yet, as
the authors say, "What physicist — even with his newest
electron microscope that magnifies 15 million times — has seen
or experienced an electron or a neutron, or a quark, or the host
of other elements believed to exist within the atom? Yet he speaks
of these things as realities."

The philosophy of reincarnation applied to problems we face today
— war, racial and religious strife, environmental and ecological
concerns, crime, the difficulties of old age — is examined.

War, racial strife: Since we have been here many times,
we have been in many different countries and races. The peace
we make in the world today will not be peace only for our children
— it will be peace for ourselves.

Environment: Especially important is our treatment of
our planet and its inhabitants, both human and nonhuman. The earth
is home for everything on it and we share it with all the kingdoms
and their evolving souls. Life in the lower kingdoms is reborn
again and again as we are. We are particularly responsible for
the animals; we are like bodhisattvas to them so we must care
for them and be compassionate toward them.

Old age and death: Death and rebirth are analogous to
sleeping and waking; all that we have learned throughout our lives
will be there for us to implement and help us in the next life,
just as when we awake in the morning, we have not forgotten what
we learned the day before. Gandhi had this to say to a friend
who had written of her mother's illness:

It is better to leave a body one has outgrown. To wish to see
the dearest ones as long as possible in the flesh is a selfish
desire . . .

The form ever changes, ever perishes. The informing spirit neither
changes nor perishes. True love consists in transferring itself
from the body to the dweller within, and then necessarily realizing
the oneness of all life inhabiting numberless bodies. — Gandhi's
Letters to a Disciple

Crime: When people realize there is an absolutely just
law of exact compensation in the universe, and that it operates
regardless of one's machinations to avoid it, perhaps they would
think twice about committing a crime.

Cranston and Williams advocate the introduction of optional courses
in death and reincarnation as part of the school curriculum. These
could be taught in the same way that comparative religion classes
are now, and let the students decide the issue for themselves.
If only all teachers (and parents) could realize that each child
is a unique being that has come from far in the past, that its
personality, wisdom, and innate quality have been developed through
countless existences, what care they might take with this delicate,
evolving being!

In October of 1979 Sylvia Cranston lectured at Harvard University
on "Reincarnation and the Book of Life," and since then
her text has been used by many university and college teachers
in their classes in religion, philosophy, and thanatology (death
education). Her lecture was regarded so highly that the original
typewritten version is at Yale University in their Rare Book and
Manuscript Library.

Portions of the lecture have been included here, offering the
beliefs and conclusions of time-honored, eminent notables of all
occupations who have intuited that rebirth is an inevitable and
essential development in the evolution of humankind (and all beings).
The material, as always with the author, is excellently researched,
richly descriptive and thoughtful. Submitted as an alternative
to present-day theories about the origin of life is the wisdom
of the ancients as taught and preserved through the ages in all
reaches of our earth.

If I were looking for a very readable book that I could give to
someone, family or friend, who had evinced the slightest degree
of interest in reincarnation, and with whom I wanted to share
a belief that is an important part of my own life philosophy;
if there were a book that could gain acceptance where no other
had — this is the book I might choose.